


we drifted to survive

by gracedbybattle



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Clones, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Post-Order 66, Reunions, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-05
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:40:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25080028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gracedbybattle/pseuds/gracedbybattle
Summary: After the war and finally free from the Empire, Cody is nursing a drink and a thousand regrets.One of them is about to walk back into his life.
Relationships: CC-2224 | Cody & CT-7567 | Rex, CC-2224 | Cody & Obi-Wan Kenobi, CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi
Comments: 63
Kudos: 670
Collections: Clones Adore Obiwan





	1. Chapter 1

Takonda is a unique place. A watering hole, a castle on the hill, a meetup for rebels and thugs alike. It’s filled with every type of smuggler and contractor alive, practically crawling with beings with different accents, languages, styles and demeanors. Maz Kanata operates an oasis for anyone trying to escape and melt into the colorful technicolor of the landscape.

It’s also a good place to not be noticed. 

Not being noticed isn’t exactly on Cody’s mind as he throws back his third round, but it’s not a bad alternative either. The ale hits the back of his throat and burns on the way down, but he ignores it. He doesn’t drink for taste. It could be slugwater for all he cares at this point. He drinks to forget. 

The catina is lively even at this dark hour. The suns have set against the forest backdrown outside and the trickle of patrons is building as they retreat inside. Takonda wasn’t Cody’s ideal destination, but it’s as good a place as any. He didn’t have a location in mind when he struck out from the Empire, and he ended up here, with so many other wandering souls. 

Working under the Empire was a bitter pill he’s learned to swallow, along with his tongue and furious retorts. He’d been drafted into the Imperial Academy after the war and in no position to do anything about it. Not until the chip was taken out. Between drinking himself sick on Coruscant after the Purge and searching for brothers who went down when it happened, he’d almost been grateful for the distraction. 

He had no love for the Empire or it’s Emperor, after the removal of the chip. Freed from it’s blind loyalty like a cut leash, he hated Palapatine with a fever he used to pit against the Seperatist Army on the battlefield. After they began phasing out the loudest voices of distant in their ranks, Cody’s hate had only grown. 

Bringing in the nat-borns to replace what remained for clones from the Grand Republic’s Army was the final blow. The Imperials were quietly but quickly phasing out as many clones, as many of his brothers, as possible, replacing them with a rank and file that had numbers instead of names, and white armour that was indistinguishable from the rest. There was no choice but to leave. 

Any of his brothers left were either decommissioned or dead. The 212st, the 501st, they’re all gone. He’s been through the lists, scoured the charts, and there’s nothing left of the Republic he remembers. He wore their colors, their mark so proudly for so long. Seeing the emblem flying on the flag of the Empire turns his stomach, but there’s nothing to be done. Palpatine is the Emperor, not the Chancellor, and he is no longer Commander of anything. 

He’s just Cody, an old, broken down Imperial retiree with grey in his beard and white in his hair, a handful of credits and a thousand regrets. 

He has nothing, the rest of the credits he cashed out when he left the Academy along with the shuttle he stole. He ditched the first transport, then the second before settling with the third after he cut it out from under a slave trader on Zygerria. The Empire has a price on his head and his credits are running dry, but at the moment, he couldn’t care about either. 

“Another round?” the cheerful Besalisk bartender asks, sweeping by his spot again. He shoves the empty canister in their direction. 

“One more,” he says, without a hint of emotion. The Besalisk makes a face at him. 

“Hope you don’t have anywhere to be, bud,” they say with a shake of their head, fetching his empty mug. “Surprised you can still sit up straight.”

He shrugs, more out of habit than anything else and stares at the bar in front of him, looking for answers in the grey granite and pebbled surface. He used to enjoy a good drink, years ago. It was almost a ritual after a campaign, to gather in one of the officer’s quarters and break out the best brew they had as a celebration. 

On one memorable occasion, General Kenobi had joined them and drank everyone, even Boil, under the table. He had always been good for the men’s morale that way, never too big or too mighty to eat with them, bunk in their quarters on the front, drink with them after a battle. Cody can clearly remember the next morning after that memorable occasion. The General had met him in the hallway, halfway to the mess, without so much as a hair out of place, smiling like nothing had ever happened. 

_“Long night Cody?” Obi-Wan asked with a knowing smirk, the one that no doubt got him labeled the Negotiator._

_He was handsome when he was smug, Cody’s brain noted helpfully. He batted the thought away. Traitorous brain._

_“You would know, sir,” he’d responded, head still ringing too loudly for his usual strict protocol. Kenobi had grinned even wider at that. While he valued Cody’s professionalism, he seemed to take an awful amount of joy in getting him to break the facade every once in a while._

_The pounding in his brain wasn’t unbearable, but it was a persistent pain. He resisted the urge to pitch his brow to alliviate the ache building there._

_“I’m not sure what you mean, Cody,” Obi-Wan said glibly, patting his Commander on the shoulder. The warm point of heat where his hand met dress blacks was comforting, and Cody fought not to lean into it. The General was smiling, blue eyes soft with a spark of thinly veiled mischief._

_Catching up with him in a ship as large as theirs was clearly intentional, especially at this hour. He wondered what the reasoning was._

_Cody could admit to himself that he paid a lot of attention to anything the General did. It was reflex, half born of an innate need to keep the other man alive and an affection for the Jedi that he couldn’t ignore. He had once grappled with that sense of attachment, towards the beginning of the war. He’d resisted it then, back when he was still convinced that the attachment to his General was temporary, and the feeling would fade in time._

_Obi-Wan tipped his head at him, thoughtful with a soft smile that said he was about to say something private, just for the two of them. Cody swore he even winked before ducking their heads together. Maybe his headache was worse than he thought._

_“Force metabolism is a wonder, truly,” his General whispered, just loud enough for Cody to hear. “I would hate to put back that much Corellian brandy without it.”_

_“As you say, General,” he groused, feeling a mix of admiration and envy at the man who stood before him. Kenobi smiled at him, and let his hand linger for a moment more, then pulled away with a pat against his shoulder. Cody tried not to miss the contact._

_Waxer had taken a look at the two of them rounding the corner, Cody still a touch droopy and Obi-Wan bright eyed as ever, saluted them before and turned the other way, shaking his head. Cody could still hear him laughing, walking down the familiar hallway recounting to Boil how Cody was definitely the General’s favorite and a complete bastard for using the Force while drinking, cursing cheating jetti good naturedly all the while._

_Obi-Wan had babied him a little that morning, slipped him a stim tablet in the morning briefing and a mug of tea left suspiciously at his desk later that afternoon. Not regular tea from the commissary either, but his General’s special brand he brought from the Temple. It had eased his headache like a damn miracle._

_Much like Obi-Wan himself._

It was a good memory. He had so many of those, before the Purge. 

The thought had him reaching back to scratch at his scar, where he had the chip removed after the Republic fell. He’d stared at the Sith-damned thing after they’d removed it in a black market clinic, asked them to save it to give him the satisfaction of crushing it under his boot when they were done. It was the closest thing he’s felt to himself since Utapua. 

His hair is growing back, close cropped curls returning in unruly tufts growing over the incision site. The tendrils of black are peppered with grey, more a sign of his continued stress than the advanced aging. It’s no secret that the clones aged quicker than nat-born’s. But then again, the Kaminoans never imagined that the majority of them would live long enough for it to matter. 

Obi-Wan had known, all the Jedi had, but his General had alway seemed to hate it the most. He could level you with the depth of emotion in those blue-green eyes, staring at Cody’s brothers with a wistful look. He’d never been the strict disciplinarian that some of the other Jedi were. Cody’s battalion didn’t experience the range of freedom and quite frankly unhinged level of supervision that his brothers in the 501st did, but they’d always been treated more like individuals than units. 

Besides, he’s had enough late night comms from Rex to know that while Anakin Skywalker was an effective General and a good man, he also toed the line of insane that would have send Cody mad with stress. Kenobi’s predilection for enemy capture had already added a handful of grey strands to his head before the first year of the war had wrapped. Rex was lucky, his natural blond hid the intermingled white from every time Anakin jumped off a moving object with no warning. 

The 212th’s General had taken a personal point of pride in knowing his troopers names, likes, dislikes, personal afflictions and did his best to cater to their strengths and they had loved him for it. The considerations he managed to make for them while in a war zone was admirable, even in addition to the compassionate nature that most of the Jedi displayed. 

Wolffe would have disagreed with him, Bly too, as they were each fiercely loyal to their own Jedi. But he knew Kenobi was the best there was. He wouldn’t have traded his General for any other in the GAR. And he’d have fought with anyone that suggested otherwise. 

Another rowdy group of patrons spill into the bar, distracting him from his thoughts. The bar is beginning to fill up, bodies close to knocking against his side. He closes his eyes, filtering the sound and presence of other beings so close. The feeling of a stranger pressing into his space is enough to make his skin crawl. 

Cody spent so long, most of his life, surrounded by brothers. Even the clones he didn’t know personally, they were all family in their own eyes. There were few secrets in Kamino and less in a warzone. Clingy, tactile cades had a tendency to climb into bunks with their brothers, seeking out touch as a comfort and Cody hadn’t been immune. 

His batchmates has been prone to dogpile as much as any of his brothers. They’d adopted Rex into their group with the tenacity of their Mandalorian namesake after the blond clone’s batchmates were discommissed at a young age. Rex was an easy target on Kamino - the blond hair didn’t help - and he’d latched onto Cody’s group like a limpet.

Rex was his _vod’ika_ in a way some of the other’s weren’t. It had always been a source of comfort leading the 212th and Rex the 501st, and their General’s familiarity had meant that they were paired often. 

Since the Empire, Cody has hardly touched another individual, and the Commander that never hesitated to throw Rex under his arm is nowhere to be found. He aches with the loss, though it is one of many. He misses Rex, Wolffe, Bly and his brothers with a pain that refuses to dull over time. It will never fade. 

But the pain he feels at the loss of Obi-Wan, his General, is something else entirely. It’s an agony he doesn’t know how to combat, so he does his best to ignore it at the bottom of a drink. He gave the order, he fired the shot to shoot his General down.

It doesn’t matter that the chip was in his head, he cannot look past the atrocity of turning on the one man he swore to protect with his own life. 

Thinking of his General means remembering the man as flesh and blood, and not a ghost. It means remembering the quiet mornings they’d spent discussing battle strategies, sipping caf over datapads, sparring together in the rec area between missions.

It means remembering that soft space between himself and Obi-Wan, a distance that he’d learned to bridge with time. A thing he had cherished, and a thing he had lost. 

The violation at killing the man who’d made him feel like an individual, like he was special, like he was more than he had ever been before, is a sickening hell that he cannot escape from. 

So, drinking. Cody swishes the liquid inside the container, carefully monitoring the beings that pull up beside him. He may hate himself, but he's not ready to die yet. He can lose himself in his memories and still be aware of the world around him. He certainly isn’t willing to be another victory for the Empire. 

Something in the latest group of stranglers catches his gaze, tracking the movement of two hooded figures at the edge of the crowd. The way the larger figure carries themself is familiar, something pinging in the back of his mind. They slip to the bar together, catching the eye of the Besalisk bartender and waving them over. The three converse quietly, away from the bustle of the crowd before separating and the bartender picks his way to the back and disappears, no doubt fetching something or someone. 

Senses now fully on alert, Cody watches the pair. They’re dressed in non-descriptive tan tunics and hooded robes, sturdy boots. To the casual eye, they might look like regular drifters, maybe a member of a smuggling freighter or a pirate’s outfit. But Cody has spent the last part of his life with Imperials at the Academy. He knows Rebels when he sees them. 

The smaller, leaner of the two flips their hood off to show a young female, humanoid, with a thick batch of curly dark hair tied at the back. She motions for a drink, accepting water and passing a second to her companion. The taller of the two reaches back to pull his own hood back and Cody’s glass slips from his fingers, hitting the counter with an almighty clang. 

“Rex?” he whispers. 

“I’m sorry?” Rex swings to meet his gaze, eyes hooded at the sound of his name. A hand has already drifted back to his side, no doubt for the safety of a blaster at being recognized. His eyes lock with Cody’s own, the same warm brown that they both share. They’re sharp with the assessment of a perceived threat, but they blow wide at the sight of his brother, recognition dawning like the sun on his face. His mouth drops open, but no sound comes out. 

Cody stumbles off his perch, silently cursing the drinks he’s had. His knees feel weak, wobbling underneath him as he meets Rex halfway. They stare at each other, Rex’s companion completely forgotten. 

“You look like shit,” he tells Rex without preamble, gazing at the sight of his brother like a ghost, eyes wide and unblinking.

He can’t quite make himself believe it’s real, one hand itching to hover over the scar from the surgery. 

“No worse than you,” Rex rasps with huge eyes, but his trance doesn’t last much more than a second. He drops his bag and steps forward, taking a hold of Cody by the shoulders and staring at him in the eye before bringing his arms around him and practically crushing him to his chest. 

At his hold, the mist breaks and Cody breathes in sharply. _It’s real,_ his mind chants at him. _It’s real, it’s real. It’s not a dream._ He can feel tears gathering in his eyes, threatening to spill with the solid feel of his brother against him. He hasn’t cried in years. 

“ _Kote_ ,” his younger brother whispers, face buried in Cody’s neck. “Cody, you bastard, where have you been? 

“ _Vod,”_ he says instead of answering, bringing a hand up to wrap it around his brother’s neck. “Rex.” He clutches Rex to him with a desperation he hasn’t felt in years. 

He hasn’t had something to lose in so long. 

The back of his mind is taking in how different Rex looks, the beard, the lack of hair, the freckles dotting his skin like he’s been spending a lot of time in the sun. But his immediate attention is just on his brother in front of him, alive and whole. 

He can’t believe it. 

The woman standing next to Rex is watching their reunion with a guardedness. “We might want to move this to somewhere a little more private,” she mutters, scanning the room with wary eyes. Rex nods against Cody’s shoulder, breath shuddering in his throat. 

Cody pulls away from Rex but keeps his hands fisted in his brother’s coat, worried that if he let’s go he’ll vanish like a dream. As they relocated to one of the separate rooms that spiderwebbed through the massive castle, he kept a death grip on Rex, and vice versa. They probably look ridiculous, like two clingy cadets freshly decanted, but he couldn’t have cared less. He left his dignity behind with the Empire, his heart and soul in Utapau. He was not letting go of the things he still had. 

“Gods, Cody,” Rex choked, drawing Cody back into another full bodied hug with a shuddered breath as soon as the door closed behind them.

They held each other for another second, Cody relishing in the feel of his brother in his arms. He hadn’t felt the contact of another friendly person since the Order came down. He swallowed around the lump in his throat and squeezed his eyes against the moisture building, clutched Rex a little tighter. 

“Where in the hell have you been, _ori’vod_?” Rex demanded, pulling back to frame his older brother’s face with his hands.

Rex’s hands were strong, callused over and scarred, weathered and worn. There were tear tracks racing down his face, unashamedly. Without the presence of a hundred other strangers, Cody took a moment to look him over. 

He was older, the way Cody was. Not just aged physically, but his eyes carried a weight Cody had never seen before. His hair was gone, but a thick beard had come in in its place, blonde white and going gray.

He was bigger, thicker through the waist and the arms but he still felt like a full slab of muscle. His eyes were the same familiar shade of brown, wide and shiny with emotion. He was staring at Cody. He couldn’t believe he was here. That he was alive. 

“I left the Empire,” Cody said, his throat dry and nearly cracking over the words. He licked his lips, trying to vain to wet his throat. Shock had nearly bowled him over. “I’ve been keeping one step ahead of them, there’s a bounty on my back.”

Rex’s eyes narrowed with a look he used to reserve for clankers on the battlefield. “The Imps had you?” he almost spat, voice gone low and dark with anger. “I should have known. We should have looked harder.”

“You couldn’t have known,” Cody rasps. He can’t stop staring at his brother, cataloging the differences since the last time they were face to face. He feels like a man dying of thirst, drinking in the sight of his past like his first taste of water in years. “I didn’t even know who I was, for so long.”

Rex stares at him with renewed focus, hearing all the things Cody isn’t saying. “The chip? You had it removed?” 

His eyes track Cody’s hairline, zeroing in on the spot at his right temple. The hair has grown back over the shaved area, so that’s almost distinguishable. 

He reaches up to brush over the spot, runs a hand through the tight black curls. Rex thumbs at the spot, feeling the raised skin of the scar underneath. Cody reaches up to touch Rex’s own scar, mirroring one another. They breathe for a moment, the rest of the world dropping away. 

Cody feels like a leaf caught in the breeze, spinning through the air. Like the entire center of gravity has reset, with Rex as his anchor. If he steps away for a single step, he will crumble against its pull. 

When their eyes meet again, Rex hauls him in, bringing their foreheads together. Cody closes his eyes, the world ceases spinning at the feeling of skin against skin. He hasn’t touched another being in so long. Let alone a friendly face. He shudders, a choked sob building at the bottom of his throat. 

He has missed Rex so much.

“Not to break up the moment here but,” a strange voice says and Cody pulls back almost immediately. Rex’s hand at the base of his skull is the only thing that keeps him from jumping back entirely.

Rex’s companion is watching them shewardly, one hip cocked with her hood off. Thick, black curly hair is making a bid for space, tied back with a tattered strip of cloth. Bright, dark eyes are calm but calculating, watching Cody with intent. She glances at Rex.

“He didn’t show,” Rex says and Cody assumes they were meeting someone here. Some sort of contact of Maz, if he had to guess. She nods and purses her lips for a moment then pulls a communicator from her sleeve.

“I’ll contact command, let them know we’ll be back later.” She gives them one more look before slipping from the room, the edges of her long hooded garment swaying as she goes. 

“That’s Shara,” Rex says, and it’s hard to detect but there’s an undercurrent of pride. It’s the way he used to talk about Fives, Echo, Jesse. “One of our best operatives, and a damn good pilot.”

Rebels, then. Cody almost smiles. Sounds familiar. “Better than Skywalker?”

Rex’s face falls at the name and Cody could kick himself. 

If he can hardly stand to hear, to even think, his General’s name then it stands to reason than Rex is no different. The years have yet to ease that pain. 

“I’m sorry,” he says before his brother can say a word. “For everything,” because if he’s going to start apologies, he might as well cover it all. 

“I should have listened to you,” he continues. “About Fives, about the chips. About everything.”

He’s never regretted anything more. He should have taken his brother seriously when he’d asked for an investigation into Fives’ death, instead of dismissing it out of hand. It had looked like a hysterical reaction in the face of grief, and he’d treated it as such.

He should have known better. It cost him everything.

He swallows against the tears in his throat, trying to choke them back down. If only he’d listened. Maybe the Republic would still exist. Maybe his brothers would be alive. 

Maybe Obi-Wan would be too. 

“I miss him, Rex,” he says softly, a confession. It says enough about the two them that Rex doesn’t ask. He knows Cody well enough not to. “Gods, I miss him so much.”

Rex is watching him with a sorrowful expression that he can’t place, something equally sad and wistful. He knew how deep the bond ran between Cody and his General. He’d been there, after Hardeen, after Zygerria, after Maul.

He’d watched them close the space between each other. 

“I shot him down,” he confesses, whisper-quiet and mangled with emotion. 

“ _Vod_ ,” Rex says and his voice is so gentle. His eyes are heartbreakingly sad. He stares at Cody for a long moment and then, when Cody doesn’t continue, his eyes light up with something new. A realization, something that looks terrifyingly like hope.

“Cody,” he says urgently and something in his tone raises Cody’s eyes to meet his brother's own. Rex searches his face, eyes wide and something lurking in his gaze. He takes a deep breath and gripes his brother’s shoulder tight. His voice is strong. 

“He’s alive, Cody. General Kenobi is alive.”

And the world drops out from underneath Cody’s feet. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The journey to Tatooine feels like the longest ride of Cody’s life.

When Cody was a cadet on Kamino, Jango Fett gave him a medallion. It was the first gift he had ever received. It was lighter than regular steel, but impossible to bend. The front was smooth, the back embossed with the symbol of a mythosaur. It was old, ancient, and handed to him with an unearthly reverence. 

Jango had looked him square in the eyes with that calculating gaze and said, “You may not be Mandalorians by birth, but you are my blood. And you will remember, and teach the others.”

They were given their own armor at the end of their training on Kamino, but he always kept the medallion on his person, his own personal token of _beskar'gam._ That was the first of many lessons about the traditions of Mandalore, the value of a history they could cherish. The language came easily to his tongue, like it knew it was a part of him. The pillars of Mandalorian culture, of their warrior ways, had emboldened their training, made him want to be better, do better. 

Many of his brothers chose their names, but not Cody. Jango had given it to him, along with the medallion. 

“You will be the best of them,” he said, laying a single hand on Cody’s shoulder. It was the most affection he ever received from the man. “ _Kote._ ”

—

The journey to Tatooine feels like the longest ride of Cody’s life. 

He keeps twisting the hem of his long cloak in his index finger and thumb, absentmindedly rubbing the fabric into a finer material. It’s a nervous tick, something he picked up at the Imperial Academy. After he smashed the chip they removed from his brain and he became Cody again and not CC-2224. 

He didn’t have a nervous tick before the Purge, but it seems that the Empire is capable of leaving all sorts of invisible fingerprints on his mind. 

The garment is one of the first things he picked up after defecting, slipped it off a distracted tenant when it’s owner was otherwise preoccupied. Back then, he was fresh off Imperial rations, still smelling like their regulation soap and hating himself every second for the parts he played, unwillingly or otherwise, in their rise to power. 

He hastily pieced together a new wardrobe on the run. Imperial issued wear was conspicuous and easily recognizable, so he’d burned most of it on his first stop. Watching the stiff grey uniform and assorted pieces go up in flames had been therapeutic in a way, but he couldn’t roam the galaxy in scraps forever. 

Being on the run had also meant a need to blend in with his surroundings and hide his face. His scar and previous standing as a Marshal Commander meant that Cody was more easily recognized than most. He’d picked out the hooded garment with that in mind. His fondness for the cloak was a touch nostalgic, in a way he only admitted to himself in the dark of night, when the warm dark fabric reminded him of General Kenobi’s robes. It was soft the way they had been, with a shorter train and the hood just as large. 

During the war, Obi-Wan had a tendency to lose robes at an astonishing pace, one that never failed to make the quartermaster grumble at the 212th’s requisition forms for more. 

On more than one occasion, Task had outwardly protested the requests, practically launching the forms back at Boil when he’d submitted them. 

But they always submitted them, and they always received their delivery. Because each trooper had noticed what Cody took little time to: that General Kenobi found comfort in the garment and therefore it was essential.

It wasn’t long into the war campaign that he had noticed Obi-Wan’s tendency to fold his arms into the large sleeves as a direct correlation to his own uneasiness or feeling unbalanced. If he was worried, or unsure about a course of action, he would withdraw within himself, the large folds of fabric cascading around his shoulders and enveloping him in it’s warmth. 

Cody had been a welcome beneficiary of that warmth, once when he took a gut shot meant for his General on a maddening campaign on Felucia. The medics had reached him quickly, but the injury had been severe enough to keep Obi-Wan at his side, waiting for him to awake after the bacta treatment. 

_He blinks awake to the sight of Obi-Wan by his side, ginger hair tousled more than usual and his head pillowed on the medbed, hands lingering near Cody’s own. He’s warm and comfortable, Obi-Wan’s brown cloak draped over himself like a personal blanket. The garment is soft, as soft as Obi-Wan’s own quiet breathing._

_Obi-Wan blinks awake, like he can sense Cody is awake. He stiffens at first to get his bearings and then stares at Cody with relief, a smile breaking over his face._

_Cody opens his mouth to say something and nearly chokes on the dryness, coughing into his hand, ruefully noting the amount of equipment he’s hooked to. Quicker than he can move, there’s a familiar hand at the back of his neck, supporting his head and raising a cup of water to his mouth. Gratefully, he let the contents wet his throat to quell the coughing and lays back against the pillows to reoriente himself before opening his eyes again._

_Obi-Wan is there, still sitting beside the bed, watching. He smiles, softly, in a way that Cody has only seen a few times before, his voice soft with his legendary greeting as he looks at him, “Hello there. It’s good to see you awake.”_

_“Good to be awake, sir,” he gets out. The bandages pull against his midsection at the words, annoying but the pain is muted. He feels a bit disjointed, which must be the pain meds.  
_

_“Just Obi-Wan, Cody,” his General smiles. He looks different here, soft and open, without the military bearing that so often weighs him down. Already, grey is beginning to creep in at his temples. “No need for formalities here.”_

_He swallows hard, wondering what it would be like to be allowed to reach up and brush the errant bangs out of the man’s eyes. The distance between them seems smaller each day, and yet, it still persists, a chasm between the things he knows he wants. “Obi-Wan,” he agrees._

_“I have something for you,” Obi-Wan continues, slipping a hand into his pocket and procuring a small coin, silver in color. Cody’s breath catches in his throat at the sight of it, the curved horns of the mythosaur just visible under Obi-Wan’s fingers. He has never shown it to anyone else and it’s almost a shock to see it in his general’s hand._

_It was an unexpected benefit the 212th received with Obi-Wan as their general, that the man was well versed in Mandalorian culture. The General was fluent in many languages, he picked them up like burrs on a sand sack and he spoke mando’a fluently, something he’d told Cody he picked up easily from his year on Mandalore protecting Duchess Satine._

_“I thought you would want to know it was safe,” Obi-Wan says knowingly. Cody stares at the medallion, always tucked in with his black suit under his chest plate and wondered how his armor had fared. “Your helmet and most of your armor is still intact,” Obi-Wan said, as though his thoughts were leaking through, which they probably were. “Though we may need to replace a few pieces.”_

_He held the coin out to slip it into Cody’s hand on the bed and he stared at it, the light catching and sending a shine across the room. The unmarked side was smooth, the result of Cody’s fingers rubbing across it for years. And then he stared at Obi-Wan, the man who loved his troops like they were family, who learned all their names and spoke their language, respected their culture, ate and drank and laughed with them. Who was important to them beyond a position as a commanding officer but something close to aliit, who Cody loved more than he could bear._

_He has wondered for so long how to tell him, and now he knows._

_He reaches forward and closes Obi-Wan’s hand around the medallion, his smaller hand encased in Cody’s own. Obi-Wan’s eyes widened, and he looked up to meet his gaze._

_“Cody?” he asked, the question hanging in the air._

_He clears his throat, making sure his voice is steady when he speaks. “Keep it safe for me,” he says quietly, pulling the robe closer against his shoulder with his other hand._

_Obi-Wan searches his face for a moment, staring at his closed hand and then back at Cody. His fist tightens and slips the medallion back into his own pocket._

_“I will,” Obi-Wan says firmly._

_His blue eyes, so different from Cody and all his vode, are staring at him. The depth in them is enormous._

_The admission has changed something fundamental between them, Cody’s most beloved possession given to Obi-Wan for keeping. Obi-Wan, no stranger to Mandalorian customs and the precious nature of beskar'gam, cannot miss the gesture for what it is._

_The air is different now, charged and thrumming with intent. If he strikes a match, Cody thinks, he will start a fire._

_“Obi-Wan,” he mutters softly as Obi-Wan reaches for him and finally, Cody lets himself reach back._

It was the first time they managed to bridge that legendary distance between them and it hadn’t been the last. 

A shuttering from the craft shakes him out of his thoughts, fingers still steepled around the edges of his cloak. A security blanket, Rex calls it. He hasn’t dismissed it. His brother probably isn’t wrong and there are worse coping mechanisms. 

“Cody?” Rex’s head pokes around the corner, leaning against the threshold. They’ve practically been living out of each other’s pockets since Takonda, Rex filling Cody in on everything he’d missed while he’d been a _shabuir puppet for the kriffing Empire,_ Rex’s words. Cody’s not yet convinced a budding Rebellion is going to be enough to break the Emperor’s hold on the galaxy, but well. They’ve done more with less. 

He doesn’t have faith in much anymore, but he has faith in his brother. And he trusts Bail Organa with him, so that’s something. 

But all of that, all of those spellbinding and grandiose plans pale in comparison to what might be waiting for him on Tatooine. 

“We’re coming up to the surface,” Rex says like Cody doesn’t already know, fixing him with that steady gaze. He’d been Cody’s anchor these past few days, a clear role reversal of most of their lives, especially as cadets. 

A part of him bristles at the idea of being coddled for any length of time, the rest is just too grateful to be around someone friendly enough to protest. He falls somewhere in the middle of the two, grousing about being helped, grumbling at any pity, but accepting the hands when they are offered. It’s more for his own dignity than anything else, he’s never been good about indebtitude. Rex had rolled his eyes at that, softly cuffed him on the head and hauled him against his shoulder. 

_“I owe you more than I can ever repay, you got that?” he’d said a little watery, like he was still getting used to the idea Cody wasn’t dead. Gods know that Cody is. “Let me have this.”_

He’d swallowed his pride and nodded, though he still keeps up his verbal protests all the same. Too much compliance would go to Rex’s head. 

“We’ll be landing shortly,” Rex continues and Cody nods tersely. The closer they’ve gotten to the planet, the more apprehensive and anxious he feels. It’s not an emotion he’s familiar with and he hates it as much as he hates the Empire itself. There’d been no place for anxiety or fear during the war, though this new dark world seems to be rife with it. 

Cody straightens in his seat, bad leg protesting in pain as he stretches and feels the muscle strain. The war hadn’t been kind to him, the Empire less so, and his body feels older than it’s deceptively young years. The left leg has been a persistent pain since the last year of the war, a bad break hastily repaired with bacta on the front lines. It might not have been an issue, except for the re-break he’d suffered at the Academy during the first month of simulation training. 

The Empire hadn’t seen the need to properly heal the bone, nor had they allowed him the time off for it. And thus, the ache. 

He can feel Rex’s gaze on him, worried as it has been lately. They have both always tended to worry about one another. Worry is just another truer, deeper form of care and he always cares about his _vode_. Lately though, those scales have tipped more in Rex’s area. He raises an eyebrow at his brother in response. “Rex, I’m fine.”

“If you say so Codes,” Rex says back reasonably, in a voice that said he thinks they should have had Cody thoroughly vetted by a real medic before journeying out here. He seemed to have forgotten what a stubborn bantha Cody could be, especially where Obi-Wan is concerned. 

He can feel the landing sequence beginning and stares out the viewport, at the endless stretches of sand racing in every direction. Rex is adamant that what they’re looking for is here, even if he hasn’t actually laid eyes on Obi-Wan since before Mandalore. 

It’s disconcerting because Cody knew his general. Obi-Wan would have never walked away from the righteous fight, not when there was still a chance for it to be won. Bail Organa is the one that sent them here, so it can’t be a lack of awareness. His absence can only mean one of two things: that he is too broken to carry on, or he has something more important to be doing. Both seem plausible, the latter less so.

But hope is a fire and it is burning hot in Cody’s chest. 

For years, he has been running on nothing but grief. Nothing but regret and remorse, burying himself in the two and hating himself more than the Empire. He’s lived with the knowledge that the person he cared for most was killed by his order, a command he was powerless to prevent, and that the rest of his life will be shadowed by that moment. 

And now, the idea that it might have been a premature pain, that he can get back the one thing he would take over the fate of the galaxy and possibly hold it in his hands again?

Cody doesn’t need Obi-Wan to be a rebel, or to even be okay. He can work with what they have. He just needs him to be _alive_. After the hell he’s lived in since Utapau, alive is more than enough. Alive is a miracle. 

“You ready for this _vod_?” Rex asks and he claps a hand on Cody’s shoulder, fingers warm against the dark cloak. He nods, pulling it tighter around him, remembering the soft fabric of Obi-Wan’s robe and the comfort of the man that owned it. He watches the sand rise up to meet them, like a sea of muted color. The ramp rises as the ship settles on the ground, the heat oppressive from the harsh desert climate, and still he can hardly wait to leave the shuttle for the dunes. 

He grasps Rex’s shoulder to stand and pulls the hood over his face, protection against the sun. Rex does the same. He clears his throat and steadies his legs, lets the heat from the outside wash over him like a wave. He breathes for a moment and then steels his soul. 

Obi-Wan is out there somewhere. He’s alive. All Cody has to do is get out there and find him. 

“I’m ready,” he says and he sounds like himself. He sounds like Commander Cody again, not CC-2224. He sounds like Rex’s _ori’vod,_ Wolffe’s batchmate, _Kote_ of the 212th. He sounds like himself. 

He’s ready. 

All his life, he had a meaning. Built for a war orchestrated by their enemy, he’s been lost since the Order fell and the war ended. But even in that fall, there is purpose. As the troopers were built for war, the commanders were built for their Jedi. 

He was built for Obi-Wan, to stand by him. If Obi-Wan is alive, then his place is by his side. There is nothing else but that truth. At the end of all things, he is Obi-Wan’s and Obi-Wan is his. That much he knows. 

Rex smiles at him, eyes soft with understanding. They have spoken so much over these few days, insecurities, regrets, fears and hope given voice to one another. They no longer need words, not when Rex knows his thoughts. His brother can hear the change in his voice, the balance. 

He drapes an arm around Cody’s shoulders to steady him down the ramp, mindful of the incline and his brother’s weak leg. For once, Cody cannot bring himself to complain. 

He’s so close to having a piece of his soul back. 

Determined and filled with purpose, they step out into the sand together. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> beskar'gam: Mandalorian armor  
> Kote: glory, Cody’s name in Mando’a  
> aliit: clan  
> shabuir: extreme insult  
> vode: brothers/siblings  
> ori’vod: older brother


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s a figure standing against the sand and it might be a mirage or it might be the most important person in Cody’s life.

They’ve trekked long enough towards the wastelands that Cody’s leg begins to protest when he sees it. Organa hadn’t been able to give them an exact location, so they’re working with what they have, vague coordinates and an endless stretch of nothing. 

At first it seems to be a trick of the light. His eyes are strained from searching against the sunlight for so long, it’s no wonder they would manifest what he wants to see for himself. But then he hears a sharp intake of breath from Rex and he knows that they’re looking at the same thing. 

A figure in the distance pauses, surely it notices them too, and doesn’t move. It’s hazy, stopping it’s trek from cresting down the nearest dune. 

Cody breathes in shakily, his eyes plastered to the sight. The figure in front of them could be anyone, any man or woman with a long, brown cloak but something in his soul churns and he _knows._

He feels Rex tense at his side, slipping back to hold his blaster in the hand not holding Cody up. Regardless of Cody’s traitorous heart, it could be a threat.

The figure approaches them cautiously, there’s nowhere else to go, and the closer they get, the more Cody’s heart pounds in his chest. He can feel someone trembling, and he can’t tell if it’s himself or Rex. Him, probably. The hooded figure approaches them, an old blaster held at their side, and stops. 

Close enough to see it’s humanoid but little else, Cody and Rex wait. Then the man, it is a man, he can see, raises his eyes and Cody gets a look at his face and his heart stops. 

Familiar blue-grey eyes peek out from beneath the hood, curious but wary. “Hello there,” says a polite voice he knows, one he’s only heard in his dreams lately. “Can I help you?”

Fingers trembling, he pushes back his own hood and goggles to show his face and watches Obi-Wan falter. His face morphs into something strange, a mixture of warriness, hope, and fear. 

“Who are you?” he asks. His voice has changed, harder now. Cody can hear the slight tremor in it underneath the edge. 

There are a million things he wants to say, so many he doesn’t even know how to start. He stares at the man across from him and wonders if it will feel like a vibroblade through the heart if he turns them away. 

_Gods, help me._

“After Felucia,” he says and Obi-Wan’s head snaps to face him alone. He swallows hard, forces himself to meet the look in his General’s eyes. 

“I gave you something.” It’s a coded message, something only Obi-Wan would recall. It was a private moment, a treasured memory, the first of many. 

He’s the only one that would understand the importance of it, and what it means. 

That Cody is himself, and not an enemy. 

For a moment, they stare at one another, cataloging differences and changes. He can see the years on Obi-Wan’s face, the lines of exhaustion and pain that are carved on his skin. He doesn't want to know what Obi-Wan sees on his face. The years have not been kind, he knows.

“I asked you to keep it, the only thing I was ever given,” he says. They’d made many promises during the war, especially after Felucia. 

He’s been so alone, Cody can tell. Obi-Wan has never liked being isolated, has always craved a certain level of companionship. Whether that was with his fellow Jedi, Cody’s brothers, or a pack of pirates, he always seeks someone. Not that he doesn’t value his quiet, he’s particularly fond of silence for extended meditation, but he’s a social creature. He’s spoken in guarded tones about his younger years, the times he’s been left behind. Cody knows enough to understand that some deeply seeded insecurities can stem from being left behind. 

Cody promised himself once that he’d never let Obi-Wan know that deep, desperate loneliness again. Not while he was around. Just another promise he’d broken. 

One of many. He swallows to keep his voice steady. Obi-Wan’s eyes are on him, wide with hope and disbelief. “I promised you once, that I’d never leave you alone. I intend to keep that.”

“Cody?” Obi-Wan whispers and Cody stumbles forward, only caught from hitting the sand by Obi-Wan himself. His General’s arms are around him, clutching with desperation. He wraps his own around Obi-Wan’s back, hands fisted in the light tunic. Burying his head in the juncture of Obi-Wan's neck he shudders and feels alive, truly alive, for the first time since Utapau. 

“ _Ni ceta_ ,” he barely manages not to sob into his shoulder, tears flooding his voice with relief and remembered grief. He’s lived with this pain for so long. “ _Ni ceta, ni ceta,_ Obi-Wan.”

“It is you,” Obi-Wan whispers, pulling back with a gentle hand circling the hidden scar on his temple like he knows it's there. He must. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have let them get so close. His face is colored with shock but slowly breaks into a heartbreaking smile, the edges of his eyes crinkling. He cradles Cody’s own in his calloused hands, like it’s something breakable, precious. 

“Hello my dear,” he says, voice watery and it nearly breaks. “I’ve missed you.”

His hair is still a bright copper in the sun, the sound of his beloved voice enough to make Cody weep. He rubs a hand against Cody’s shoulder and his touch could burn. “I know about the chips,” he says and Cody's heart bottoms out with an aching relief. “Bail told me. I know it wasn’t you,” his voice shutters. “There’s nothing to forgive. It wasn’t you.” 

“It’s gone,” Cody says quickly, voice tight with emotion. “I had it removed as soon as I knew.” It’s important that Obi-Wan knows how essential that is, how he woke up and wanted to eat his own blaster, the way he wanted to walk into an ocean and never come up again. 

They’re on the ground wrapped around each other and he’s desperately glad for Rex, no doubt watching both their backs in case any threat comes along. He doesn’t want to move at all, not while he has Obi-Wan in his arms. 

“I mourned you,” Obi-Wan says, as he brushes a hand through his too-long curls, tracing a feather light hand down the scar of his face. “So much. But you’re here.”

He leans into the touch like he can’t help it, unable to stop staring at the man in front of him. His bright auburn hair is shot through with more grey than Cody remembers and there are deep lines of stress cutting across his brow, but it’s Obi-Wan. The man he thought was dead. The one he thought he killed. 

The one he loves.

Cody cups the back of his neck, pulling their foreheads together and Obi-Wan lets him, his trust implicit in every move. His heart feels as though it could burst in his chest and he takes a moment to steady himself. Breathes for a minute before gathering his courage and leaning forward to press his mouth to Obi-Wan’s. 

Obi-Wan makes a soft sound and presses back, quelling any lingering doubt, and for a moment, Cody let’s himself melt into the moment, boneless. They linger before pulling back nose to nose, a hair’s breadth apart, foreheads together. Obi-Wan’s eyes are wet and he reaches forward with a dirty hand to wipe the tears from Cody’s cheeks, the ones he didn’t even know were there. The tenderness is nearly too much for his heart to take. No one, not even Rex, has ever held his heart so gently in their own hands. 

They breath for a moment, hands caught on one another, an unearthly peace between them. Obi-Wan is smiling and when he sees Cody’s eyes are on him, he reaches into his tunic and pulls out something familiar. Cody stares, his eyes watering in a way that has nothing to do sand.

His _beskar’gam_ medallion, the one Jango Fett gave him so many years ago, is hanging on a chain around Obi-Wan’s neck. It shines in the sun, catching brilliantly on the rays of light reflecting off the sand. Obi-Wan moves to drag the chain off his neck, but Cody steadies his hand.

“You kept it,” he says, still a bit in awe that he has it, after all this time. After everything that happened. 

“Of course,” Obi-Wan says, their hands held together. His eyes shine. He brings their joined hands up to press his lips to the knuckles, the coin between them. 

“You asked me to,” he says simply, like it’s the easiest thing in the world. As good as any promise. 

His brother clears his throat behind them and Obi-Wan breaks away from Cody to look at him for the first time. “Rex, is that you?” he asks, tender expression melting into something surprised and joyful at the sight of Cody's brother. They have always been fond of one another. He squeezes Cody’s hand once and then rises, stepping forward to envelop Rex in a hug. 

Cody watches them from the ground, content at the sight of them together. His leg is screaming at him in protest but he pays it no mind. His whole world is right here, in the middle of this godforsaken, glorious desert. Nothing else matters. 

“It’s good to see you, General,” Rex says hoarsely, emotional and struggling to hide it. “It’s very good to see you, sir.”

“None of that now, Captain,” Obi-Wan says, putting both hands on his shoulders. “There are no formalities here. Not anymore.” His smile is slightly pained, but it’s a smile all the same. Genuine. “Just Obi-Wan will do.”

“Rex,” Rex counters, matching his smile with one of his own. He gestures to Cody. “I take it the two of you are already well-acquainted?” he says, his old humor showing through. He’s never passed up a chance to tease Cody. The years have done nothing to erase that. 

Obi-Wan laughs and the sound is enough to nearly close the open wounds in Cody’s heart. He can barely commit himself to an eye roll in Rex’s direction, struggling to his feet and nearly pitching forward. Obi-Wan grabs him just in time to steady him on his feet, concern washing over his face. 

“Cody? Are you alright?” his voice is tight with an anxious worry. 

“I’m fine,” he reassures, placing a hand over Obi-Wan’s own and squeezes it tight. Damn his kriffing leg. 

“He’s not,” Rex throws in, stepping around them both to take Cody’s arm over his shoulder, effectively shouldering his weight. “But he might work on that, now.”

Obi-Wan, always easy to read between the lines of words unsaid, nods with understanding. His smile is back, the real one, full of light and a brightness that is impossible to dim. 

They could light entire galaxy’s with it, Cody is sure. 

“I have a place nearby,” Obi-Wan says to them both. “We can make it there pretty quickly, a speeder is just over the ridge. It’s not much, but it’s an adequate shelter with food and water.” He sounds apologetic, which Cody can’t understand. Sand, sea or mountains, this is where Obi-Wan is. Cody never wants to anywhere else, ever again. 

“You’re here,” Cody says and the words are a victory. As much as the way Obi-Wan looks at him when he says it, like the world might be worth fighting for again. “That’s all I need. If you’ll have me, Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

The statement is a proposal as much as a question, one he’s wanted to ask for so long. The past years have been filled with many regrets, and not asking for this is one of them. For so many days, he has stared at the bottom of a drink and wished for one more chance, one more moment to say the words he wants to say. 

He’s not living with that regret one more day. 

He stares at Obi-Wan, unable to look away, one hand grasped in his own. His General’s hand is as familiar as his own, digits light and slender, betraying none of the strength that lives within his being. These hands have wielded a lightsaber, hefted a mountain, bandaged troops. They’ve held Cody’s face in his hands, gentle and kind. Obi-Wan’s eyes are wide with understanding, the unsaid meaning ringing between them.

He knows.

“I would,” Obi-Wan says and his voice is thick with tears, but he sounds happy. He’s smiling at Cody, reverent and real. He’s alive and he’s smiling at Cody. Force, what a miracle. “ _Kote_ ,” and his name had never sounded better. “I would.”

He takes Cody’s other side and tucks underneath him, securing his other arm around over his shoulders. His slight weight fits against Cody’s own like a glove, as though he was made to stand there. He clasps Obi-Wan’s hand in his own, tight and incredibly warm. His throat tightens and he fights against the tears that threaten to spill from his eyes again. He tugs Obi-Wan close, tucks his head into his neck and just breathes, the feel of the other man’s heart against his body, thumping along strong and healthy and alive.

“ _Cyar’ika,_ ” Cody says, eyes closed. Rex is at his side, keeping him on his feet even though the world has righted itself. “ _Ner’jetti._ ”

They pull apart and Obi-Wan rests his head against Cody’s own, eyes open and warm. Cody never wants to stop looking at him. “ _Ratiin, Kote,”_ he says, his voice soft. _“Ratiin.”_

Rex clears his throat, after a beat. “Well, I need out of this sun,” his brother says, a barely concealed smirk on his face. The less they linger out here, the less likely they are to attract unwanted attention. “We’ve got plenty of time to talk. Let’s get out of here.”

The wind snaps around them, the world falling back into his sight. It’s bright and the heat merciless, like he’s noticing it for the first time. He can feel Rex flex beside him, more than ready to escape the elements. Obi-Wan is there, his hand in Cody’s own. 

Everything seems brighter, now.

Cody closes his eyes against the sting of the wind, resolute, Obi-Wan on one side, Rex on the other. And he walks forward.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ni ceta: I kneel, groveling apology  
> beskar’gam: Mandalorian armor  
> Kote: glory, Cody’s name in mando’a  
> cyar’ika: darling, term of endearment  
> ner’jetti: my Jedi  
> ratiim: always


End file.
